[asterisk-ss7] Where's Matt been? Well, here's the explanation

[Kaloyan Kovachev]

Hi
 joining Matthew and thanks very much Attila! Without your patches and
support there would be much less successful libss7 installations.

On Fri, 26 Mar 2010 10:33:53 +0100, Attila Domjan <adomjan at tvnet.hu>
wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> I have some remark 
> 
> - should add many members to asterisk channel structure to carry the SS7
> attributes, eliminate the tons of SS7_* channel variables
> - implement the new channel structure memebers to pass on other channel
> types (SIP, IAX2)
> - adding type flag on SIP/IAX2 channels to describe the peer is
> "custemer" -> hide callerid if presentation not allowed, don't pass many
> additianal channel attributes, "trunk" -> pass many attributes to peer
> as the channel driver can
> - I had many dirty hacking around dtmf in chan_dahdi for for alarm
> systems. I had turn off dtmf detection on dahdi -> SIP/MGCP g711 calls.
> The alarm systems communicates 10digits/sec... So would be nice if a new
> bridging option, turning off any dtmf detection on uncompressed media
> bridging.

Are the hacks included in svn version? Can you point me to specific part
of the code (is it DAHDI_IGNORE_DTMF_REGENERATE), as i have similar
problems with alarm systems, but had no time to work on it yet. Is it
possible to turn off the DTMF detection per specific inbound number (per
call) or just in general?

> I have not posted all off the patches to bugs.digium.com you can find it
> in my svn.
> 
> This version is stable, I'm using in my production system, have 10k+
> customers, with modified asterisk 1.6.0.9 + modifed chan_mgcp (NCS,
> realtime, PacketCable COPS).
> 
> A
> 
> On Thu, 2010-03-25 at 23:40 -0500, Matthew Fredrickson wrote:
>> Hey all,
>> 
>> It's been a long time.  I apologize for my quietness for the last while

>> here, it has been a very busy year this last year with some of the
other 
>> projects I've been working on.
>> 
>> I just wanted to let everyone know that I'm still alive, and haven't 
>> given up or forgotten about libss7, and Asterisk with SS7.
>> 
>> I appreciate very much Attila's great work on getting libss7 polished 
>> up.  He's done a very good job taking it to the next level, and has
done 
>> a great job helping everyone out.  Thanks very much Attila.
>> 
>> As far as getting his code merged back in, I was in the midst of this a

>> while ago, but had to stop due to personal time issues as well as some 
>> other potentially architectural issues that subsequently came up. 
>> Hopefully we can get that moving again in the next little bit though.
>> 
>> I actually have been quite busy, and hopefully have some things to show

>> for it, two things actually.
>> 
>> I'll not go into too much detail tonight (as it's getting quite late) 
>> but I'm looking for some hungry testers, that wouldn't mind beating up 
>> on some probably alpha level code.
>> 
>> They are:
>> 
>> 1.) libss7 point code clustering support.
>> 
>> Basically, you can have Asterisk boxes share signalling links now using

>> this code.  Although the signalling links are physically terminated on 
>> other machines, you can plug bearer T1s/E1s into other Asterisk boxes 
>> and virtually utilize the signalling links of the other boxes.
>> 
>> 2.) A new channel driver, called chan_ccs, that allows, among other 
>> things, you to control MGCP media gateways for bearer trunks, instead
of 
>> having to locally terminate them on the asterisk box that's controlling

>> the signalling links.  There is also code in the same branch that has 
>> chan_ccs that modified chan_mgcp so that Asterisk can act as a media 
>> gateway (since I don't have any good real media gateways to test on). 
>> This basically means you can have Asterisk TDM channel scalability up
to 
>> (in the ideal state) the same level as you can do with SIP with no 
>> media, per box.
>> 
>> In essence, this is turning Asterisk into a "true" softswitch, allowing

>> native bridging between media gateways and any other RTP endpoint 
>> (including other media gateways).  This also means that you don't have 
>> to terminate bearer T1s/E1s on the main signalling box.
>> 
>> -- So, what does this mean for you, you may be asking?
>> 
>> These are really the next steps in making big SS7 work with Asterisk. 
>> They both allow for scaling a point code across multiple asterisk 
>> machines, and distribution of bearers on different boxes than the ones 
>> that contain signalling links.
>> 
>> Like I said though, most of the work is in a functional but early
phase, 
>> and so I need some people that are interested enough in the added 
>> functionality that they're willing to work with potential hickups along

>> the way.
>> 
>> Some of the changes I've had to make to libss7 have made it further
more 
>> difficult to merge Attila's changes back in, which is the other reason 
>> why it has been so long and it still has not been merged.
>> 
>> If you're interested, either reply to me or this thread and let me
know.
>> 
>> Thanks again,
>> 
>> Matthew Fredrickson
>> Digium, Inc.
>> 
>>